‘Arrival’ is as confusing as it is enlightening

Amy Adams in a scene from “Arrival.”
Share on facebook
Share
Share on twitter
Tweet
Share on email
Email

No sense in pretending Denis Villeneuve’s “Arrival” isn’t as loopy as it is lofty, as confounding as it is exhilarating, as confusing as it is enlightening.

I’m not gonna tell you I understood every little thing going on between Amy Adams and those extraterrestrial beings, or between Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner, or between Amy Adams and Forest Whitaker, or between the whole lot of ‘em and yours truly, the viewer.

But even most of the WTH (what the heck!) moments were beautiful and challenging and cool in a thought-provoking, intergalactic kind of way.

“Arrival” is not the kind of alien invasion movie where all sense of mystery and wonder is quickly stripped away in favor of epic CGI battle sequences in which a band of hopelessly outgunned, wisecracking misfits figure out a way to destroy the Mother Ship or the Queen Bee or whatever. It’s SO much better than that, in a “Close Encounters,” “Contact,” “Interstellar,” “The Day the Earth Stood Still” kind of way.

Mostly, though, “Arrival” plays like a high-end, handsomely appointed, feature-length version of a classic “Twilight Zone” episode. Most of the thrills and chills are of the intellectual and philosophical sort, and we’re asked to take a leap of faith when it comes to the time-space continuum, and why not, let’s do it.

Amy Adams, that wonderful chameleon of an actress, is certain to attract Oscar nomination talk with her fierce and wonderfully nuanced work as Louise Banks, an expert linguistics professor leading a quiet and somewhat lonely and isolated life. Louise is so out of touch with the outside world she seems to be the last person on campus to notice there’s a huge piece of breaking news blowing up on everyone’s laptops and personal communication devices:

Aliens have landed.

A dozen identical black ships, each looking a bit like a gigantic football sliced in half, have landed in locations around the globe. Because Louise is arguably the most skilled linguist in the world, she finds herself on a U.S. military transport, along with theoretical physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner), to one such landing spot in Montana. They’ve been recruited by Forest Whitaker’s Col. Weber to see if they can establish some sort of communication with the mysterious creatures residing within those ominously quiet ships.

The ordeal of merely getting into position to come face to face with the aliens makes for an exhausting, crazy, tense, even darkly funny sequence during which you have to remember to breathe. Louise and Ian are equal parts terrified and beyond thrilled to be a part of this insane and historic breakthrough.

Director Villeneuve (“Prisoners,” the criminally under-seen “Sicario”) is an immensely talented stylist who knows it’s best not to show TOO much of the aliens.

Eric Heisserer’s adaptation (and expansion) of Ted Chiang’s short story titled “Story of Your Life” weaves seamlessly between genres, from the poignant, heartbreaking story of Louise and her daughter, to the sci-fi adventure, to the Big Idea stuff. I’m not entirely convinced the ending is the perfect landing to everything that transpired before, but “Arrival” is not a linear adventure of the mind, and it is a film probably best seen twice.

Rating: Three and a Half Stars out of Four

Related To This Story

Latest NEWS